Belated Anniversary Post

Look at that - we're walking away from our first year of marriage. I’m a day late on our anniversary post. And here we are on December 12 – the first day of year 2! We had a lovely anniversary, in spite of the fact that the Bears totally threw away a game in the 4th quarter. Dave was fairly unmoved by the whole thing, because he was so excited that it was our first anniversary and didn’t even care about the game. Right, Dave? Right? As much as I loved year 1, Dave and I are both really excited to have one year down, and to be moving into a new year.

I know some people say you have to date for a long time before getting engaged and getting married, because if you haven’t gone through very much with that person, how can you feel confident entering into a lifelong partnership with them? And I think that’s smart. We definitely should’ve had a couple of kids before getting engaged, because how else would I have known what kind of father he’d be? And we should’ve probably moved somewhere together, because otherwise, how would we know how the other person responds to new situations?

Seriously, though, people say that the first year is hardest, but that can’t possibly be true, because we haven’t even had kids yet, and I literally can’t believe that’s easier than adjusting to marriage. I’ve heard stories about Dave’s childhood and I’m pretty sure that unless the kids are all-Lauren, we’re in for some mischief. And even if they are all-me, we’re in for some weird, moody teenage years. Sure, there have been some hard things about this first year, and some weird one-ness things about marriage that have been difficult to get used to, like sharing a bank account. One of us has spent too much money on art projects and one of us has spent too much money on speaker wire and I’ll let you guess who did what.

But that’s all pretty surface-y. You’ll get the good stuff, like having someone to take care of you when you’re sick – and the bad stuff, like deciding who does what chore around the house. But at a deeper level, it’s been so challenging and awesome to see life through a different lens. And combining my life and vision with someone else’s. It definitely isn’t easy, but it makes us grow. And, it’s pretty fun.

When I asked Dave what he was most looking forward to about year 2 of our marriage (because I like to celebrate milestones by asking deep, vision-y questions), he said “a baby.” Oh, nope; he said, “not a baby.” He also said, “learning more about each other.” And I thought that was really cool, because even though he is my spouse and my lifelong partner, there are a lot of things I’ve still yet to learn about him, and vice versa. I thought he was pretty excellent before we got married, but since entering into marriage and living with him every day, I’ve found out some more things that I absolutely love about him:

1. He is an excellent traveler. Seriously, navigates airports and new cities like a pro. He doesn’t shy away from visiting places where he doesn’t know the language or culture. Instead, he’s just excited to explore a new place. This is very important to me, because I love going new places, and there’s nothing worse than traveling with someone who’s slow or afraid of new places. If you cannot navigate airport security like a competent human being, I will leave you in the dust.

2. He’s just an adult who knows how to do things. Single people, if you wouldn't call yourself a realist and have your head in the clouds at all, I cannot overstate the importance of this quality in a spouse. He makes real dinners with more than one dish. He remembers to change the oil. He DVRs things when I’m out of town for work.

3. He pushes me to do things I love to do. Like write this blog. Many times, he’s asked why I haven’t been writing very often, and when I come up with dumb excuses, he doesn’t let me get away with it. He pushes me to do what I love, even if I feel like I don’t have time or energy or confidence.

4. He’s honest with me. The good thing about being married to someone who’s blunt and says what he's thinking is that he’ll tell you what's really on his mind. And sometimes he’ll tell me something I don’t want to hear, but because of it, I grow and learn and (hopefully) change. Sometimes I’m too stubborn to change, but hey, it’s only year 1. Give me some time. Recently,
I told him about something I was thinking about doing, but that I thought I wouldn’t be qualified enough or good enough to do, and he said, “Why not? You could do it. You should do it.” And he was serious. He really believes I can and should pursue what I want to do.

5. He pushes me to think about what I believe. Every once in a while, when we’re lying in bed at night about to fall asleep, he’ll start a sentence with, “today, on Drudge, I read…” (or unfortunately, sometimes, “today, Rush Limbaugh said…”) and that’s when we know it’s all over. We’re going to be awake for the next two hours talking politics. And even though we have fairly different opinions, I have some of the best political conversations with him, because he has thoughtful, informed opinions, and respects the fact that I do, too. Even though we totally disagree on certain things. But he asks me tough questions, which encourage me to truly assess what I think and why I think it. For a brief moment in time this fall, we thought Jon Huntsman might bring our divided hearts together, but now that’s not looking so good.

6. He picks his battles. I’m pretty sure this is a tactic people use with their children, but I think it’s fairly useful with your spouse, too. He knows me, and knows when I’m frustrated or tired or stressed. And sometimes – in those times – I’ll say or do something that bugs him, but he knows me well enough to know when to turn something into an argument, and when to just be like, “ok, let’s just let this go” or, "let's talk about this again when you've had some coffee." I can’t tell you how nice it is to be married to someone who challenges me to live and love better, but also is full of grace and easy-going-ness (that’s a word).